h the moral poet has sung,

"The paths of glory lead but to the grave!"

Methinks, now, as we are entering into a sabler mass of shadow, that the
doctrine of eternal punishment of sins committed in time--but--

"Here's a health to all good lasses,
Here's a health to all good lasses,
Pledge it merrily, fill your glasses;
Let the bumper toast go round,
Let the bumper toast go round!"

Best on your oars, lads. Hamish! the quaich! give each man a caulker,
that his oar may send a bolder twang from its rollock, and our
fish-coble walk the waves like a man-of-war's gig, with the captain on
board, going ashore, after a long cruise, to meet his wife. Now she
spins! and lo! lights at Kinloch-Etive, and beyond on the breast of the
mountain, bright as Hesperus--the Pole-star of our Tent!

Well, this is indeed the Londe of Faery! A car with a nag caparisoned at
the water edge! On with the roe, and in with Christopher and the Fish.
Now, Hamish, hand us the Crutch. After a cast or two, which, may they be
successful as the night is auspicious, your presence, gentlemen, will be
expected in the Tent. Now, Hamish, handle thou the ribbons--alias the
hair-tether--and we will touch him behind, should he linger, with a
weapon that might

"Create a soul under the ribs of death."

Linger! why the lightning flies from his heels, as he carries us along a
fine natural causeway, like Ossian's car-borne heroes. From the size and
state of the stones over which we make such a clatter, we shrewdly
suspect that the parliamentary grant for destroying the old Highland
torrent-roads has not extended its ravages to Glen-Etive. O'Bronte,

"Like panting Time, toils after us in vain;"

and the pointers are following us by our own scent, and that of the roe,
in the distant darkness. Pull up, Hamish, pull up, or otherwise we shall
overshoot our mark, and meet with some accident or other, perhaps a
capsize on Buachaille-Etive, or the Black Mount. We had no idea the
circle of greensward in front of the Tent was so spacious. Why, there is
room for the Lord Mayor of London's state-coach to turn with its eight
horses, and that enormous ass, Parson Dillon, on the dickey. What could
have made us think at this moment of London? Certes, the association of
ideas is a droll thing, and also sometimes most magnificent. Dancing in
the Tent, among strange figures! Celebration of the nuptials of some
Arab chief, in an oasis in the Grea